


The Blurry Line Between Friendship and Family

by AmazingViola



Series: Of Unlikely Friendships and New Beginnings [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spiderman (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Dead May Parker (Spider-Man), Endgame? What Endgame?, Father-Son Relationship, Fluff, Gen, Irondad, Michelle Jones Is a Good Bro, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark acting as Peter Parker’s parental figure, no beta we die like men, not really mentioned though (like at all), sorry sorry but I had to do it for the story, violin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-30
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:15:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25611178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmazingViola/pseuds/AmazingViola
Summary: It was like stepping into another world. The small courtyard shimmered under the steadily falling snow, the dark color of the tree trunks standing out sharply against the white snow. Even the city was calm, the snow shrouding it like a blanket, dampening its usual bustling energy to an eerie silence.The two walked out of the elevator together, and as Peter watched Natsuko’s expression of wonder as she turned in a circle, her arms thrown out, the snowflakes swirling around her, he was filled by a single thought: this is home.~Or how Peter discovers that sometimes the best friends are found in the least expected places.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Michelle Jones, Peter Parker & Ned Leeds, Peter Parker & Original Female Character(s), Peter Parker & Pepper Potts, Peter Parker & Tony Stark, Peter Parker & Tony Stark & Pepper Potts, Peter parker & Ned Leeds & Michelle Jones, Tony Stark/Pepper Potts
Series: Of Unlikely Friendships and New Beginnings [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1856404
Comments: 1
Kudos: 20





	1. A beginning

**Author's Note:**

> A little background on the world in which this story takes place; it follows MCU canon up through Spiderman: Homecoming, but after that it deviates from canon quite a bit. A few months after Homecoming (about November, 2016), May dies in a car accident (sorry, sorry, I know) and, since Peter doesn’t have any other living relatives, Tony and Pepper take him in instead. There’s lots of drama while the three of them figure out how to be a family into which we will not be going in this story (during which time Tony also buys back Stark Tower so as to be closer to Midtown), but in the end they figure it out, and Tony and Pepper officially adopt Peter at the end of his sophomore year (June, 2017). This story starts at the beginning of Peter’s junior year, so he has been living with Tony and Pepper for almost a year now, and it's been a few months since they adopted him. 
> 
> I think that’s all of the logistical stuff, so thanks for bearing with me! I hope you enjoy the story!

Peter groaned, laying his head down on his arms. It was only the second week of the new school year, but he was just done.

“That bad, huh?” Ned asked, setting his lunch tray down on the table and sitting down next to Peter.

“You have no idea.” Peter grumbled through his arms. 

“Is he already dead? That was fast.” MJ said as she poked his shoulder a little.

“Your lack of concern hurts me.” 

“Get over it, loser.”

Peter gave her a glare as he sat up and started disinterestedly picking at the food in front of him. The three friends fell into an easy silence, each lost in their own thoughts. There were very few things that were nice about being the least popular people in school, but having a table all to yourself in the lunch room was one of the few perks. 

Peter was pulled out of his thoughts by Ned bumping him with his elbow. “Dude, do we have Lang homework?”

“Huh? No, I don’t think so.” Peter shrugged, trying — rather unsuccessfully — to remember what they had done in Lang that morning.

“What do you mean you don’t think so? Haven’t you already had Lang?”

“Well yeah, but I may not have been paying attention the entire time.” Peter shrugged again. “I’m pretty sure it’s just that ‘Getting to Know You’ survey. Right MJ?” He asked, glancing over at MJ. “MJ?”

“Hm?” MJ was paying absolutely no attention to the conversation Peter and Ned were having and was instead completely focused on the cafeteria door closest to the table where they were sitting. Peter glanced over, trying to see what she was looking at. 

“Hey, isn’t that one of the kids from Physics?” Ned asked, looking over too. 

Peter, Ned, and MJ were all taking a newly offered class that year called Advanced Physics Principles and Mentorship. Three days a week it met as a normal junior level class, albeit more in depth than a standard high school physics class, and the other two days they had combined classes with one of the eighth grade Physics classes at Midtown. It was touted as an opportunity for the juniors to get to explore more advanced physics topics while also giving them an opportunity to work with and mentor the eighth graders. 

“That’s an eighth grader?” Peter asked disbelievingly. 

The girl standing in the door was tiny and definitely not an eighth grader. She looked Japanese, with her long black hair pulled back into a simple ponytail, and her hands were gripping the straps of her backpack so tightly that her knuckles were turning white. Actually, she just looked terrified overall. Even from where he was sitting, Peter could see how her shoulders were tucked in close to her body, how her hands were shaking where they were clenched around her backpack. 

“What was her name again? Na- something?” Ned asked, his brow furrowing as he tried to remember.

“Natsuko.” MJ said, still not looking away from the door. 

“She looks like she needs somewhere to sit. We should invite her to our table.” Peter glanced over at MJ to see what she thought.

“Yeah, sure.” She said nodding. “Also forewarning, she pretty much doesn't talk, so don’t be idiots.” With that said, she raised her voice a little and called out Natsuko’s name. 

Natsuko looked up, surprised, from where she was standing in the doorway. It took her a second to find who had called her name, but once she was looking at them, MJ made a waving motion with her hand, inviting her over. Natsuko hesitated for a second, looking uncertain, before slowly making her way over to their table. 

As she walked over, MJ smiled a little at her and said, “We thought you looked like you needed somewhere to sit.”  
Natsuko gave them a small smile and ducked her head a little, clearly her way of saying thank you before she sat down next to MJ. Peter noticed a few things right off the bat as she sat down. For starters, she was still uncomfortable — she was holding herself stiffly, with her arms wrapped around her body — and even though she sat down next to MJ, she had left more than a foot of space in between them. 

Peter smiled at her a little, hoping to show that she was welcome and didn’t have to be nervous. “Hi, I’m Peter, and this is Ned.” He said gesturing to Ned, who was busy frantically pulling his spanish homework that he had forgotten to do out of his backpack. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Natsuko ducked her head again a little in answer. Sensing her discomfort, MJ guided the conversation away from Natsuko and started talking about the movie that she had watched that weekend. 

~

Over the next couple of weeks, they started falling into a rhythm. Natsuko would come sit with them at lunch and work on her homework or just listen to what they were talking about. As Natsuko started sitting at their table more and more often Peter noticed that while she came to the lunchroom every day, she never actually ate anything. He considered the possibility that she was eating her lunch in one of her other classes, but he could see that she didn’t get the school lunch and didn’t seem to have a lunch box or food of any kind in her backpack. While he couldn’t be completely sure, Peter had an aching suspicion that she didn’t have any sort of lunch. His suspicion that she wasn’t getting enough food was only further confirmed by how small she was — not just skinny, but small in every sense of the word — and how he could often hear her stomach growling. It was quiet enough that the others didn’t notice, Peter didn’t think he would have been able to hear it if not for his super hearing, but it still made Peter worry. 

He was torn, because he wanted to give her some of his food at lunch, but he was worried that might scare her off. In the end, he decided that he needed to try to do something, so on Monday of Natsuko’s third week of sitting with them, he decided to take action. Taking action really only meant offering her his apple at lunch, but hey, you’ve got to start somewhere. 

The school lunches always tried to give out a piece of fruit in a desperate attempt to encourage their student body to eat a balanced diet, so instead of eating his apple like he usually would, Peter shrugged and said, “You know, I’m not really hungry anymore. Natsuko do you want my apple?” He could see the completely incredulous look Ned was giving him out of the corner of his eye — since the spider bite Peter was pretty much always hungry—, but Ned seemed to understand what Peter was trying to do and thankfully didn’t say anything. 

Natsuko froze for a second, surprised, before hesitantly smiling and reaching out to take the apple Peter was offering her. He had no doubt that she saw right through him, but as long as she took the apple, he wasn’t going to complain. 

After that, it started being more common place for one of them to give Natsuko some of their lunch. It was usually just a piece of fruit, or a bread roll; nowhere near enough to be a full meal, but better than nothing. 

Still, their real breakthrough on the food front came in a rather unexpected form: Ned’s cooking class. Through a series of complicated circumstances that no one, Ned included, understood, Ned ended up taking a cooking class as his elective for all of first semester. The class, called “An Introduction to Food”, was completely as ridiculous as it sounded, but the single positive of Ned’s enrollment in the class was that it meant that almost every day he had something that they’d made in class to share at lunch. Ranging from tacos to puppy chow and everything in between, it was the perfect opportunity to give Natsuko some extra food. Ned firmly maintained that his mom didn’t want him cluttering up their fridge with his “cooking adventures”, and as long as someone else took the first piece of food, Natsuko was perfectly happy to snack away on whatever Ned had brought. 

Slowly Natsuko started to come out of her shell. She would more and more often participate in their conversations, nodding along and sometimes even laughing when one of them said something funny. She was definitely starting to get more comfortable around them, but even after two weeks of sitting with them, Natsuko had yet to say a word. Peter was worried that they were doing something wrong or accidentally doing something that was making her uncomfortable, or even that they should be trying harder to get her to talk, but when he brought up his concerns at dinner, Pepper assured him that they were doing everything right, they just had to give her time. 

So, rather than trying to force Natsuko to speak, Peter endeavored to wait and let her speak in her own time. 

~

Aside from lunch, the only other time Peter saw Natsuko during the day was in Physics. Their joint Physics classroom was set up with all of the desks arranged in pairs; the idea was that there would be one junior and one eighth grader at each pair of desks, so that they could be lab partners and just generally work with each other on days when both classes were together. Earlier that week, they had changed seats, and Peter was now paired with Natsuko, something about which he was quite happy. Even though she still hadn’t spoken and mostly didn’t participate in their conversations at lunch — at least not in the traditional sense —, Peter still felt like the two of them had grown closer over the last few weeks of her sitting with him, Ned, and MJ. 

That day they were having a lab day, focusing on the inherent magnetic properties of specific materials. After running a few experiments, the juniors and eighth graders were each given a worksheet to work on. Truth be told, it was not the most interesting topic ever, and after finishing his worksheet in a matter of minutes, Peter considered getting out his other homework or doing something productive, but opted instead to doodle in the margins of his worksheet. After about five minutes of mindlessly drawing, Peter felt something poke his arm. Glancing over, he saw Natsuko looking up at him.

“What’s up?” He asked, glancing quickly at her paper. 

She was almost done with it; there was only a single question left blank in the middle of the sheet. Assuming that that was the issue, he leaned over a little to read the question. It asked, “How could you measure the attraction between the two magnets?”

“Okay…” Peter said looking up again, “what part don’t you understand?”

Natsuko frowned as she pointed down at the word “attraction”.

Peter paused for a second, confused. “You don’t know the word attraction?” He felt her stiffen next to him and shrink back a little, and he cursed himself for asking such a stupid question and quickly tried to backtrack. “I mean that’s totally fine. Alright, um … well, so, attraction is when two things are attracted to each other. Shoot, that was an awful definition. Let me try again.” He took a deep breath and let it out. “Attraction is when there’s force between two objects. Like, do you remember how the two magnets stuck to each other? Like they were pulling on each other?” Natsuko nodded a little. “Well, that’s called attraction. So this question is just asking how you would measure how strongly the two magnets are pulling on each other. Does that make sense?” She nodded again. “So, how would you do it?”

Natsuko though for a second, before lifting up her hands and mimed pulling them apart, looking up at Peter questioningly. 

Peter let out a little huff of laughter. “Yeah, that works.”

As she looked down to write her answer, Peter thought about what had just happened. There were a couple of explanations he could think of for why she didn’t know the word “attraction”. He knew she was smart — for starters, she was at Midtown, and besides that, you could just tell by how she acted— so that obviously wasn’t it. He also knew that she was Japanese, but he had just assumed that she was Japanese-American; it had never occurred to him that English might not be her first language. As he looked a little more closely at her paper, he saw immediately that this explanation was correct. While most of the answers of the worksheet were simply numbers and calculation, the questions that needed full length answers were written in a rather random combination of English and Japanese. Peter concluded that she must have moved to the US from Japan rather recently for her to still be that uncomfortable with the language. 

Once Peter realised that Natsuko had only recently come to America (and told Ned and MJ about it), it was really quite obvious. Peter felt kind of stupid for not realizing it sooner. One of the more humorous instances of Natsuko being unfamiliar happened at lunch one day. Ned had a bag of Cheetos with him that he had brought from home, and when he saw Natsuko looking at them curiously, he offered a couple. Looking doubtful, she grabbed a single Cheeto from the bag and held it up to look at. After a second of inspecting it suspiciously, she very cautiously took a bite from one end. After about a second of chewing, she wrinkled her nose in disgust and, as tactfully as possible, spit the rest of the Cheeto out into a napkin. Peter couldn’t help but smile at how offended she looked as she looked down at the rest of the Cheeto in her hand. After carefully putting the rest of the uneaten Cheeto on the napkin as well and carefully folding it up, Natsuko looked up at Ned disbelievingly, who was still happily munching away on his cheetos. 

“Why?” she asked, seemingly genuinely confused as to why anyone would ever willingly eat Cheetos.

Peter was so surprised he almost fell off his chair. MJ, bless her, showed no outward signs of being surprised and responded without missing a beat. “Sometimes it's better not to ask.” 

Natsuko did not look remotely satisfied with this answer, but let it go for the time being, turning back to the banana bread muffin (the latest project from Ned’s cooking class) that she had been eating before the whole ‘Cheeto incident’. After that the conversation moved on, as Ned and MJ started talking about the new topics for Academic Decathlon, but Peter was still reeling. Natsuko spoke to them! Sure, it was only one word, but still, Peter finally felt like they were making progress.


	2. An Unexpected Discovery

As the weeks went by, Peter had gotten quite good at reading Natsuko’s body language. As she got more comfortable with him, Ned, and MJ and they got better at understanding her, even without words, they started to notice less and less her sparse use of verbal communication. Even without speaking, she fit herself perfectly into their conversations, so naturally that it seemed like she had been friends with them for years, not just over a month.

So, all in all, by the middle of September, Peter felt like he had a pretty firm grasp on Natsuko’s personality. 

Ha. 

~

“Okay, that’s enough for today.” MJ called out as everyone started packing up their books. Ned and Peter smiled at each other, relieved. Academic Decathlon was going in full swing now, and sure, Peter loved it, but the practices could still sometimes be a lot. 

Looking down at his backpack, Peter realized that he had forgotten his Calculus textbook in his locker. 

“Shoot, I forgot my Calc book. I’m going to go grab it, I’ll see you guys tomorrow.” He waved at Ned and MJ before heading out of the library, where they had been practicing. Decathlon met till 5 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which meant that the hallways were completely empty as Peter walked over to his locker. It was nice not to have to dodge around people or block out the incessant noise created by a couple of thousand of teenagers all in the same place, but it was also kind of weird to see the hallways that were usually so full of life completely deserted. 

After quickly grabbing his textbook from his locker, Peter decided to head out the doors in the music wing, which were closer to his locker, instead of walking all the way back to the main entrance. He hadn’t really spent much time in the music hallway since he quit marching band freshman year. Despite being a STEM school, Midtown had quite a good music department, with a couple of nice rehearsal rooms for the bands and orchestras, and in between the rehearsal rooms there were smaller practice rooms for students to practice or have lessons. 

It was just after 5, almost two hours since school had ended, so Peter was quite surprised when he heard music coming from one of the practice rooms. It sounded like a violin, and whoever was playing it was obviously extremely talented. His curiosity getting the better of him, he walked closer to see who was practicing. When he got close enough to the practice room to see in the window, he stopped short in surprise; standing in the practice room with a violin resting easily on her shoulder was Natsuko. She had her eyes closed as she played, so she had not noticed that Peter was there yet. 

Peter watched in fascination as she played. He had never heard anything like it before. The piece she was playing was clearly very difficult, it almost sounded like there were two or three violins playing, not just one. One voice, in the lower register was running dark, urgent triplets while another voice above it sang out a hauntingly beautiful melody. 

It struck Peter just how at home Natsuko looked. Gone was the shy girl who sat with them at lunch, Natsuko looked confident and relaxed, even as her fingers coaxed the devilishly difficult music out of her violin. Even though he had never heard the piece before, Peter could clearly feel the frantic urgency and the sorrow as the piece rose and fell, it was almost like Natsuko was telling a story not just playing notes. Peter did not claim to know much about music, especially not classical music, but he was pretty sure that this was not how most eighth graders sounded. 

He was drawn out of his thoughts by his phone buzzing in his pocket. Stepping away so as not to bother her, he looked down at the phone in his hand. He had one message from Tony, asking him whether he was going over to Ned’s or going to be home for dinner that night. He glanced quickly back at the practice room, where Natsuko was still playing, before turning away and typing out a quick response to Tony, saying that he’d be home soon. He would have liked to stay and talk to Natsuko, but he didn’t want to bother her while she was practicing, so he decided that he would talk to her about it tomorrow at lunch. 

~

As he sat on the subway, Peter couldn’t stop thinking about how Natsuko had looked as she played the violin. She had seemed so confident and peaceful; it was like she was a completely different person. He pulled out his phone, idly wondering whether there were any videos of her on YouTube. It seemed pretty unlikely, but it was worth a shot. Opening up YouTube, Peter realized he didn’t actually know Natsuko’s last name, so he decided to just search “Natsuko violin” and see what came up. Peter clicked on the first video that came up, which seemed to be of Natsuko. From that video he gathered that her last name was Tanaka, so he searched that instead. 

It took Peter’s phone a second to load, but once it did, he almost dropped it in surprise. As he scrolled down, there were dozens of videos of Natsuko performing. Some of them were with orchestras, others seemed to be solo competitions. Peter was about to click on one of the videos at the top when the subway overhead dinged, letting him know it had gotten to his stop. He quickly got off the train and walked the short distance to the tower. After saying a quick hello to Tony and Pepper, who were sitting side by side at the island discussing some new Stark Industries initiative, Peter flopped down on the couch and pulled his computer out of his backpack. 

Peter entered Natsuko’s name into the search bar again and looked at the videos that came up. After a second, he clicked on one at random. Reading the description, he saw that it was of Natsuko playing Saint Saens’s Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso with the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra. Even though he didn’t know a lot about classical music, Peter was struck by just how clear and mature her tone was, how every note was deliberate and perfectly in tune. 

Peter spent the next ten minutes or so just flipping haphazardly through the videos, until he felt the couch cushion beside him dip down as Tony sat down next to him. 

“What’re you looking at, bud?”

“Huh? Oh, videos of Natsuko playing violin.”

“Natsuko like your little friend Natusko?”

“Yeah.” Peter tilted the screen of his laptop so that Tony could see it better. 

“Oh my god. She’s tiny. That child is an eighth grader?” Tony asked, doing a double take. 

“Uh huh. I know. Apparently she’s like a child prodigy or something.”

“And you didn’t notice. For the last month?”

“... maybe.”

Tony let out a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. “You never cease to astound me.”

“Hey, it’s not my fault I didn’t notice!” Peter spluttered indignantly. “She hasn’t mentioned anything about playing violin. Not once!”

Tony just quirked an eyebrow in response before turning back to the computer screen. 

“Hang on a sec,” he tilted his head, leaning closer, “does that say Menuhin?”

Peter clicked on the video’s description. “Natsuko Tanaka. Menuhin Competition 2017, Closing gala.” Peter read out. “What’s the Menuhin Competition?”

“It’s one of the most prestigious music competitions in the world.” Pepper said, sitting down on the other side of Peter. 

“Oh.” Peter said, unsure how else to respond.

“Yeah, ‘oh’.” Tony shook his head. “And by the looks of it, Natsuko seems to have won the 2017 Junior Division.” 

“Wait, that was like, this year!” 

“It looks like the competition was in January.” Pepper said, just as her phone dinged quietly. Glancing down at it, she frowned, before looking back at Tony and Peter as she stood up. “I’ve got to take this, but I shouldn’t be long.”

“Good luck.” Tony said dryly, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek and standing up as well. “I’m going to get a start on dinner. Does pasta and meatballs sound good to you Pete?”

Peter nodded and let out a hum of appreciation, looking back at his computer screen. “Do you think she has a Wikipedia page?”

“Maybe.” Tony responded, rummaging around in the cabinets for ingredients. “One way to find out.”

A few quick keystrokes revealed that Natsuko did, in fact, have a Wikipedia page. It felt somehow wrong to read it, but Peter’s curiosity won out in the end and he clicked on the website. 

“What did you find?” Tony asked from the kitchen. 

“Yeah, she has one.” Peter scrolled down a little. “It says here that she was born in Nagasaki in 2006. Hang on.” He frowned and did some quick math in his head. “That would make her 11. But she’s an eighth grader.” 

“Huh.” Tony said, glancing over a Peter. “That explains why she’s so small. I guess she skipped a couple of grades. What else does it say?”

“Oh yeah. It says here that she was homeschooled until … last year. That probably explains it. It also says … oh man.” Peter paused as he read a little to himself. “It says here that her mom and her brother were killed in a plane crash when she was seven. And then her dad died at the beginning of the summer, so she’s living with her uncle who lives in New York now. Man that sucks.”

“Yeah, that’s rough. I guess that explains the not speaking english thing. She’s only been here a couple of months. That’s not very much time to learn a new language, especially with two languages as different as English and Japanese.” 

“Yeah. Wow. I had no idea.” Peter looked down and closed the tab with the Wikipedia page on it. “I feel kind of bad for reading it now.”

“Feel bad about reading what?” Pepper asked, walking back into the room. 

Peter quickly summarized what he had read for her.

“Oh, the poor thing.” Pepper said as she sat down next to Peter on the couch and put her arm around him. “How did you find out?”

“She has a Wikipedia.” Peter responded, leaning into Pepper’s side and closing his eyes as she ran her hand through his hair. 

Leaving the sauce and pasta to cook, Tony joined them on the couch as well, resting his arm on Pepper’s shoulder. 

After that, their conversation drifted away to more mundane topics as Peter, Tony, and Pepper sat on the couch, content simply with each other's company.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! If you’re interested, the piece that Natsuko was playing at the beginning was Ernst’s Grande Caprice on Schubert’s Der Erlkönig. Even if you’re not a fan of classical music, I would really recommend that you give it a listen. (I would recommend Hilary Hahn’s recording of it, I think she does the best job at conveying the emotion of the piece.) It is honestly one of the most difficult, but also most beautiful pieces of music I’ve ever heard. Thanks, I hope you have a nice day!


	3. The Start of a New Normal

The gentle sounds of a violin greeted Peter as he headed towards Midtown's back door. Since he had seen Natsuko practicing last week, he had made a habit of leaving out of the back doors as it gave him an excuse to walk by the practice rooms where he could, without fail, find Natsuko practicing. As usual, he stopped in front of the practice room and waited for her to finish her phrase before knocking on the door. 

“Sounds great.” He smiled at her.

She ducked her head and smiled back.  _ Thanks _ . 

“ Have a good rest of your day. I’ll see you tomorrow!” 

She smiled again and waved a little.  _ You too _ . 

Just then, one of the school janitors came around the corner and stopped short in surprise at seeing Peter and Natsuko there. 

“Sorry kids, but you’re going to have to go. We need to do a deep clean of the practice rooms, and we can’t have anyone in them while we're doing it.”

“Oh, okay.” Peter said, nodding to the man, before turning back to Natsuko. She had turned around and was carefully putting her violin in its case, but just by the way she was holding herself, Peter could tell she was upset. 

That was how the two of them found themselves standing outside Midtown’s back door, Natsuko absentmindedly fiddling with the straps of her violin case, which she had slung over one shoulder. 

Peter didn’t know the details of Natsuko’s living situation. He knew from reading her Wikipedia that she lived with her uncle, but other than that, he had no other information; Natsuko had never once mentioned her uncle or anything about her home. Still, despite the noticeable lack of information, they all had the feeling that Natsuko’s home situation wasn’t awesome. The first tip off was of course her lunch, or more accurately lack thereof. That was a clear indicator that whoever was supposed to be taking care of her was not delivering on at least the food front. Peter knew from personal experience that Midtown offered free lunch, so it wasn’t a money issue, so it must be that her uncle had just never set it up. 

While that was the most obvious example, there were other, more subtle, signs of neglect as well: the fact that she had only a few outfits, all of which were old and worn; the way she asked Peter for help on her homework, as if she were scared that he would be mad at her or not help her at all; the way that she curled into herself whenever someone raised their voice at all. And the last one, which only Peter knew: how she spent pretty much all of her time at school. No matter how late Peter left, she was always there, practicing or just sitting in the practice room doing her homework. 

Peter glanced over at Natsuko, who was hesitating just outside of the door. She was trying to hide that she was upset, but he could see through it. 

“You know, you could come over to my house for a little, if you want.” The words were out of his mouth before he could think about them, but he found that he meant it. “Tony and Pepper won’t mind.”

Natsuko hesitated for a moment. “You are sure?” She asked quietly, not quite looking at him. 

“Yeah. Totally. We could just hang out and do homework. You could even practice if you want.” Not wanting to pressure her, he quickly added, “I mean, it’s okay if you need to go home, I get it, I just thought I’d offer. So what d'ya say?”

She smiled and ducked her head, nodding slightly.  _ Okay _ . 

“Great!” He grinned excitedly at her. “I usually take the subway home. Is that okay with you?”

She tilted her head slightly at him in confusion. Peter quickly thought through the sentence he had just said, trying to figure out which part she hadn’t understood. 

“Do you … ” he paused for a second, “do you not know what the subway is?”

She shook her head a little, looking up at him with wide eyes. 

Peter’s surprise must have shown on his face, because Natsuko quickly ducked her head down and shrank in on herself a little. 

“No, no, it’s fine.” Peter was quick to assure her. “No need to be embarrassed. I just wasn’t expecting that. Really, it's fine.” He reassured her again. “The subway is just the name for the public trains that go all over New York.”

Natsuko nodded and continued playing with the strap of her violin, still a little hesitant. 

“You ready to go?” Peter asked, hitching his backpack a little further up on his back. 

At Natsuko’s nod, the two set off in the direction of the subway. As they walked, Peter was reveling in the fact that this was going to be Natsuko’s first ever time on the subway, when a sudden thought hit him:  _ she’s going to hate it _ . As soon as it occurred to him, he was absolutely certain of it. She was going to hate everything about the subway: the loud noises, the smells, and most of all, all the people. With a sinking stomach, Peter glanced down at his watch to see that it was precisely 4:30, the height of rush hour. The train was going to be packed. 

As if sensing his worry, Natsuko looked up at him in concern, her eyes wide and eyebrows drawn together.  _ What’s wrong? _

“Uh…” Peter stalled for a moment, deciding how much to tell her. He didn’t want to freak her out, but he also didn’t want her to be caught completely by surprise by the subway. “Well … I feel like I should warn you a little.” Seeing the flash of panic in her eyes he quickly assured her, “It’s nothing bad. It’s just that the subway runs underground so it’s going to be loud, and it’s rush hour right now, so there are going to, well, be a lot of people on the train. But don’t worry, I’ll be with you the entire time and we can try to find the least crowded car to get onto.”

Peter’s reassurances seemed to do nothing to lessen Natsuko’s worry, and Peter’s heart clenched at the way her hands shook where she was holding the straps of her violin. Before Peter could say anything else, they arrived at the entrance to the subway. Peter felt Natsuko shy closer to him as people streamed out of the entrance. It broke Peter’s heart that Natsuko was this scared of something as simple as a subway station, but he also felt warmth flood through his stomach at the fact that she trusted him enough to seek comfort from him when she was feeling overwhelmed. 

“Can I put my arm around you?” he asked gently, looking down at her. Natsuko froze for a second before giving a tiny nod. Not wanting to startle her, Peter very slowly wrapped his arm around her shoulders. She shifted a little further into his side, and like that they walked into the subway station. 

It was a short walk to their platform, but it felt like an eternity to Peter. He felt awful about bringing Natsuko there. He could easily have asked Tony or Happy to pick them up at school, he just hadn’t thought of it. 

The train pulled up just as the two of them arrived at the platform, and Peter winced a little at the loud roar of the wheels on the track and the screech of the brakes; he had gotten much better at handling his enhanced senses over the last couple of years, but it still wasn’t always perfect. 

Quickly, he scanned the cars, trying to find the least crowded. It was a non-trivial task, made even more difficult by the fact that he couldn’t really move with removing Natsuko from where she was tucked into his side, which was not something he was keen on doing. In the end, he chose a car, mostly at random and quickly stepped in. All things considered, it wasn’t too crowded for rush hour traffic, but still there wasn’t a lot of breathing room. 

Peter guided Natsuko over to the corner of the car where they would have a little more space, but he could still feel the way her breaths were coming quicker and quicker and how her entire body was shaking. 

“Hey, it’s okay. Try to take some deep breaths for me okay?” He exaggerated his breathing, making sure each breath was deep and slow. “We’re going to be okay. We’re just going to stay right here, I’m not going anywhere.” Peter kept a steady stream of quiet assurances going as other people filed into the train car. The angle they were standing at was slightly awkward with the violin case on Natsuko’s back, so she slipped it off and stood it up next to them, still keeping her hand securely on the handle.

Things were going relatively well — or as well as could really be expected — until the train started moving. As the train lurched into motion, Peter felt Natsuko freeze, her entire body going stiff. Just one look at her face let him know that she was somewhere in her mind and it was most definitely not in a subway car in New York. He wasn’t sure what had set her off, maybe the sudden motion or the roar of the train on the tracks or the way the mass of people shifted as the train started moving, but in the end it didn’t really matter;  _ something _ had set her off, and Peter was getting more worried by the second. Her breathing had sped up again and even around the noise of all of the other people and the train car, Peter could hear how quickly her heart was beating. Between him and Tony, he had seen (and experienced) enough panic attacks to know that Natsuko was seconds away from one. 

Peter quickly racked his brain, trying to remember what Tony did to help him calm down when he was panicking.  _ His headphones, of course! _ He moved one hand down to make sure the violin case didn’t fall over, because it didn’t quite seem like that was one of Natsuko’s priorities at the moment. With the other hand, he reached into his backpack to grab the headphone’s Tony had made for him. They didn’t look special, but Tony had made them so they blocked practially all sound; not even Peter’s enhanced hearing could pick up on anything when he was wearing them. 

“Natsuko, can I put these headphones on you?” Peter asked, turning back towards her. She didn’t give any response, but didn’t move to stop him either, so Peter took that as a yes. He carefully reached over and slipped the headphones over her head and quickly pressed one of the buttons on his watch.

“KAREN, can you play some background music quietly through my headphones?”

“Of course, Peter.” KAREN’s smooth voice responded. 

Tony had recently upgraded KAREN so she would be accessible from Peter’s watch as well as his suit. It came in handy much more often than Peter had originally thought it would. 

With the headphones firmly over her ears, Natsuko slowly started to calm down, her breaths coming easier, her heart rate slowing down. Peter felt his shoulders sag in relief. Without looking up, Natsuko let her head fall forward to rest on Peter’s chest, and he gently wrapped his arm around her, gently rubbing up and down on her back. At some point she had grabbed onto his shirt with one of her hands, where it remained even after her breathing returned to normal, balled in the soft fabric of his t-shirt. 

They stayed in that same position — Natusko’s head resting on Peter’s chest, his arms wrapped securely around her — for the rest of the train ride. Peter could feel the eyes of the people around him gazing over curiously at the two of them, but he ignored them. If this was what Natsuko needed right now, like hell was he going to ask her to move just because people were looking at them funny. 

After what seemed like a small eternity — but in reality wasn’t much more than ten minutes —, Peter heard the overhead crackle on above him. 

“Next station, Columbus Circle.” 

As the train began to slow down, Peter carefully slipped one of the straps of the violin case over his shoulder with one hand, then gently started to guide Natsuko towards the train door. She looked up at him confused, but he just smiled back, nodding toward the door. They made short work of making their way back out of the subway station, Natsuko’s hand tightly gripping his shirt, the headphones still over her ears, but only once they were completely outside again, did Peter finally feel like he could breathe. Natsuko wasn’t looking at him, but she seemed much calmer now too. He tapped her lightly on the shoulder to get her attention, then gestured to the headphones, asking if he could take them off her. She gave a little nod, so Peter carefully reached over and lifted the headphones off her ears. 

Peter turned to put the headphones in his backpack then turned back to look at Natsuko. She didn’t meet his gaze and looked at the ground instead as she shifted from foot. 

“What’s up?” He asked, leaning down to try and see her face better. She moved her head away, not meeting his eyes. “It’s okay. I’m not upset, but I can’t help unless you tell me what’s wrong.”

She shifted back and forth for the space of a breath before practically whispering, “Sorry.”

Peter’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Sorry for what?”

Instead of responding, she just gestured back at the subway entrance behind them. 

“Hey.” Peter crouched down directly in front of her so she had no choice but to look at him. “You never have to apologize about anything like that, okay? I mean it. It’s nothing to be ashamed of and nothing to apologize about. Really.”

She let out a tentative nod, still looking slightly unsure. 

“Are you ready to head over to the tower? It’s about a 5 minute walk from here.”

Natsuko nodded again, this time more definitively, so Peter stood back up, readjusting the violin on his back before wrapping an arm around Natsuko’s shoulders and heading towards the tower. 

~ 

The walk to the tower was a short one, and before long Peter and Natsuko were standing in front of Stark Tower. As he started making his way into the lobby, Peter felt Natsuko tug at his shirt a little. 

“What’s wrong?” He asked, looking down at her. 

She stared up at him then looked up at the building, her eyebrows drawn together in confusion. 

Now it was Peter’s turn to be confused. He shook his head a little. “I don’t get what you’re asking.”

Natsuko looked pointedly at him again, then at the doors in front of them. When Peter shook his head again, she let out a little frustrated huff. She paused for a second, before taking a careful breath. “Not going home?” she asked slowly, tilting her head up at him. 

“Oh”, was Peter’s eloquent response. It had been all over the news for so long when Tony and Pepper announced that they had adopted him, that it hadn’t even occurred to Peter that Natsuko would not know. It’s not like it came up in conversation that often — Peter didn’t make a habit of flaunting his living situation —, but Peter still felt stupid about not having thought of the fact that she wouldn’t know.  _ What was he supposed to say now? _ ‘Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that literal Ironman and Pepper Potts are my parents’?

Natsuko was still looking up at him questioningly, so Peter cleared his throat and took a second to organize his thoughts. 

“Continuing in the saga of me being an idiot, I may have forgotten to mention that Tony Stark and Pepper Pots are my adopted parents. So, actually, this is where I live.”

Peter looked down at Natsuko to gauge her reaction. She still looked a little confused but more unsure now as well. 

“Ironman?” She asked, looking at Peter with wide eyes. 

“Well, yeah. I live with Ironman. But he’s really nice, I swear. And he’s mostly retired now anyway.” Natsuko looked decidedly overwhelmed, so Peter gently placed an arm around her shoulder. “It’s going to be fine, really. Are you ready to head in?”

At her small nod, Peter carefully steered her towards the doors into the lobby. Natsuko had at some point grabbed onto Peter’s shirt again, and as they entered the lobby, he felt her grip tighten slightly. He had to agree with her; the lobby of Stark Tower could be quite intimidating. Even after living there for the last three years, sometimes when Peter came in, he would just take a second to look around in awe. 

With a gentle squeeze on her shoulder, Peter brought Natsuko’s attention away from the tower and back to him.

“It’s pretty cool, huh?”

She bobbed her head up and down in response, still staring up at the high ceiling. Peter couldn’t help but smile at how adorable she looked as he led her back to the private elevator he usually used. Peter felt Natsuko’s grip on his shirt tighten again as they stepped into the elevator, and he frowned at how she flinched slightly when the elevator started gliding upwards. He was about to ask her if everything was okay, when FRIDAY’s voice came smoothly out of one of the speakers in the corner of the elevator. 

“Good afternoon, Peter. Good afternoon, Ms. Tanaka.” 

Natsuko startled again, looking around quickly trying to identify where the voice was coming from. 

“That’s FRIDAY.” Peter explained. “She’s Tony’s AI. She runs the tower.” 

Natsuko nodded again, still looking confused. 

“FRIDAY, take us up to the penthouse please.”

“Of course, Peter.” FRIDAY responded. “I am sorry for starling you, Ms. Tanaka.” FRIDAY continued, before saying something in what sounded to Peter like Japanese. 

Natsuko’s head flew up in surprise. She paused for a second before responding in Japanese as well. 

Before Peter could question how FRIDAY spoke Japanese — and how she knew that Natsuko spoke Japanese for that matter —, the elevator glided to a stop and the doors slid open. In what seemed rather to be a habit at this point, Natsuko shied closer to Peter. He had let Tony and Pepper know that he was having Natsuko over when they were on the subway, so he was unsurprised to find Tony sitting at the island, reading something on his StarkPad. Tony smiled at them as they walked into the room and stood up to greet them.

“You must be Natsuko.”

Natsuko ducked her head shyly in response, but Peter had spoken quite a lot to Tony and Pepper about her, so Tony didn’t seem at all surprised. Peter also noticed that Tony carefully kept some distance between himself and Natsuko, clearly not wanting to overwhelm her. 

“It’s nice to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you.” He turned to Peter. “How was school Pete?” 

“It was fine. Nothing too exciting.” Peter responded shrugging. “We were just planning to hang out and do homework. We can go to my room if we’re in the way here.”

“Not at all!” Tony responded, making his way back to where he had been sitting. “I’m not doing anything important, just boring executive stuff.” He let out a short huff of laughter.

“I’ll tell Pepper you said that.” Peter said as he led Natsuko over to the table. 

“You wouldn’t dare.” 

Peter chose not to respond and instead opted to stick his tongue out at Tony as he pulled his laptop out of his bag. He heard Natsuko let out a little giggle at his antics as she followed suit and pulled one of her folders out of her backpack as well, and shared a quick triumphant look with Tony. 

The three of them lapsed into an easy silence, each working on their own separate task. Natsuko had been a little tense at the beginning, but she slowly got more relaxed, especially once Tony had FRIDAY play some classical music in the background. At one point, she even started humming along to one of the pieces. 

“Do you know this song?” Peter asked, glancing up from his Calc homework. 

Natsuko nodded, smiling a little. 

“FRIDAY what piece is this?” Tony asked, glancing at the two of them. 

“This is the first movement of Schubert’s Quartet No. 13 in A minor, also known as the Rosamunde Quartet, sir.” FRIDAY responded.

“Cool.”

Peter hummed a little in agreement before going back to his homework. 

~

Peter had just about finished his homework when Pepper came in. Natsuko had finished about 20 minutes earlier and was now curled up in her chair reading a book in Japanese. It never ceased to amaze Peter how small she could make herself, her entire body easily fitting on the chair. 

Pepper was still wearing her business clothes, having come straight from work, but she had let her hair down from its usually tight ponytail to hang loosely around her face. She gave Tony a quick kiss before easily sitting down next to him at the table, across from Peter and Natsuko. 

Natsuko had stopped reading and was looking at Pepper shyly. 

“Hi sweetie, I’m Pepper. It’s nice to finally meet you.” Pepper said, smiling. 

Natsuko smiled back, fidgeting a little with the book in her hand. 

Sensing her discomfort with being the center of attention, Pepper turned to look at Peter. “Did you have a good day at school?”

“Yeah. It was okay. Nothing really happened. Mr. Johnson showed us pictures of his kids, which was fun.” He responded, closing his laptop. 

“Are you already done with your homework?”

“Yep!”

The four of them fell back into silence for a couple of minutes, before Tony glanced down at his watch and, noting the time, said, “We’re thinking of just having takeout Thai for dinner.” He turned to look at Natsuko. “Do you want to stay? If you need to head home, that’s fine too.”

Natsuko looked up, shaking her head. She paused for a second, realizing that that could be interpreted each way, then quietly said, “I can stay. If okay with you?”

If Tony was surprised at her talking, he didn’t show it. “Definitely, we’d be happy to have you! Do you want to look at a menu?”

Natsuko nodded, looking unsure. 

“FRIDAY, pull up one of Wondee Siam’s menus.” 

“Sure thing, boss.”

Tony handed his StarkPad over to Natsko so she could take a look at the menu. After reading through the menu for about a minute, Natsuko looked up at Peter, looking decidedly overwhelmed. She looked down at the menu again, then back up at Peter with wide eyes.  _ Help _ . 

“Yeah, their menu can be a lot if you don’t know what you’re looking for.” He said, smiling at her encouragingly. “Have you ever had Thai food before?”

Natsuko shook her head. 

“Okay, that’s fine. I’m sure you’ll love it.” Peter chewed his lip as he considered what she should order. “Well, first things first, do you like spicy food?”

Natsuko tilted her head at him in confusion.

“Uh, like food that hurts your tongue?” Peter tried again, but Natsuko kept looking at him in confusion, clearly not understanding. “Oh I have an idea!” He looked excitedly up at the ceiling. “FRIDAY, how do you say spicy in Japanese?”

FRIDAY said something in Japanese, and Natsuko wrinkled her nose in disgust. 

Peter let out a quick laugh. “Okay. I’ll take that as a ‘no’.”

Natsuko shook her head, her face still adorably scrunched up.

“Do you have any allergies or things you can’t eat?” Tony asked glancing up from where he had been reading something Pepper was showing him on her phone. 

Natsuko shook her head again. 

Peter thought for another second, before saying, “How about we just get another order of Pad Thai and Pad Se-Iew. Neither of them is spicy, and they seem like a good way to introduce someone to Thai food. Does that sound good to you Natusko?”

Natsuko nodded, shrugging a little. 

“Wonderful.” Tony clapped his hands. “FRIDAY, place our usual order from Wondee Siam and add an order of Pad Thai and of Pad Se-Iew.”

“Your order has been placed, boss. Your food should be ready in approximately 25 minutes.”

“Thanks, FRI.” Tony said, grabbing his StarkPad back from where it was sitting in between Peter and Natsuko. 

“Do you want to watch something ‘till the food arrives?” Peter asked, looking over a Natsuko.

She nodded enthusiastically and the two of them made their way over to the couch. As they sat there, watching a nature documentary with Thai food on its way, Peter knew that there was no other way he would rather spend his evening. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments and constructive criticism are greatly appreciated!


	4. Spiderman

Peter let out a whoop of elation, wind whipping his face as he swung between the rooftops of New York. Of all of the parts of being Spiderman, this was truly one of his favorites. Nothing compared to the freedom of flying through the city, unhindered by the burdens and distractions of everyday life. 

Letting out another laugh, Peter swung over to one of the nearby offices, executing a graceful flip before landing on the roof. As he sat on the edge of the building, legs dangling off the side as he looked out at the city sprawling out beneath him, he felt the tension of the day bleed out of his shoulders. 

“KAREN, got anything for me?” Peter asked, scanning the streets around him. 

“My scanners do not detect any suspicious looking activities in the surrounding areas.”

“Okay. Let me know if anything comes up.” He focused on the sounds of the city around him, trying to identify anything that could be a call of distress. It only took a minute or so for him to identify a suspicious conversation a few blocks out. 

There seemed to be two men talking. “Well, you’re a pretty one aren’t you?” The first voice growled out. 

“This doesn’t need to be hard.” The second voice was slightly deeper than the first. “Just keep that little mouth closed and no one needs to get hurt.”

Peter was already swinging his way over to where the voices were coming from when he heard the first man laugh, followed by a small, terrified whimper. Ice cold panic gripped Peter’s insides, causing his entire body to lock up and him to miss the next building entirely with his web. After scrambling for a second to shoot another to stop himself from falling out of the sky, Peter managed to right himself and land on the closest building. 

He stood for a second on top of the building, frozen in place, unsure of what to do. To say that he was terrified would be the understatement of the century; not by the laugh — he was no longer surprised by the cruelty that humans could possess —, but by that little whimper that followed it, because  _ he knew that whimper _ . Over the last few months he had learned to identify that whimper anywhere; it was the little noise that Natsuko made when she was about to start crying. 

Peter stood still, unable to force his feet to move from their spot on the roof of the building. He knew he needed to go help her — he was Spiderman, this is what he did! —, but he couldn’t get the thought out of his head: what if he caused them to hurt her, what if he made it  _ worse _ . 

It had happened before that a mugger would become violent only once he had shown up, and often that violence would be aimed at the victim, not at Peter. He still clearly remembered a night, about a month ago, where just that had happened when Peter had swung up to confront him. Peter had seen the woman, seen the knife, but he had been too slow. He remembered going home that night, numb and covered with blood, and sobbing in Tony’s arms until he couldn’t see or breathe or think. As he stood there on the roof, all Peter could see was that night, but instead of the woman bleeding out on the ground, it was Natsuko. Little, bubbly, Natsuko, staring up at him with wide, terrified,  _ betrayed _ , eyes. 

Peter was snapped out of his thoughts by the second man’s voice again. “Aww, don’t cry little one.” He said in mock sympathy. “We’re just going to have a little fun.” 

More than the words the man was saying, it was Natsuko’s terrified sniffling that finally pulled Peter into action. There was a possibility that his presence would make the situation worse, but he couldn’t just stand there and do nothing. He swung across the city in record time, the excitement of flying momentarily forgotten; his only thought to get to Natsuko faster. 

When Peter reached the alleyway where Natsuko was, he wasted no time with his usual quips and jokes, instead he webbed the two men to the wall before they even knew he was there. Only once the two were firmly stuck to the wall of the alleyway, maybe with a little more web than was strictly necessary, could Peter truly breathe. 

Peter landed gracefully a few feet from Natsuko, who was curled up into a little ball on the ground, and without thinking, he immediately started moving forward to comfort her, like he always did. At the last second, Peter stopped short, backing up again quickly as he remembered that to Natsuko, he was not Peter, he was Spiderman. Sure, Natsuko had probably heard of the masked vigilante, but still, he was a stranger; it had taken Natsuko weeks to let Peter touch her, he had the feeling that she would not take well to some random person touching her, even if it was to try and comfort her. Still, even if he couldn’t touch her, it hurt Peter to see Natsuko scared like this, so he knelt down next to her. 

“Are you ok, miss.” He asked, as gently as possible.

She looked up at him, her cheeks wet with tears. 

“Hey, hey, hey.” It broke Peter’s heart to see her like this and not be able to comfort her. “It’s going to be okay. No one’s going to hurt you.”

To Peter’s surprise, instead of shying away from him, Natsuko reached out towards him, the way she did when she wanted physical comfort. Without a second of hesitation, Peter wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close to his chest. She melted into him, burying her head in the crook of his neck. They stayed like that for a couple of minutes, before Natsuko pulled away and looked up at him. 

“Peter.”

“What!” Peter spluttered. “Uh, I’m not a Peter. I don’t know any Peters. That’d be crazy!”

Natsuko gave him an unimpressed — though still slightly teary — look. 

Peter let his shoulders drop resignedly. “How did you know?”

She just shrugged, smiling a little. 

“Fine.” Peter sighed. “Just don’t tell anyone.”

Natsuko nodded seriously in response as she started to get up.

“Do you want me to walk you back to your apartment?” Peter asked, standing up as well. 

Natsuko curled into herself a little, and gave a tiny nod, avoiding Peter’s eyes. Noticing the sudden change in her body language, Peter’s brows furrowed in concern. 

“Hey, what’s up?” He asked, crouching down so that he was at the same level as her. 

Natsuko fidgeted, still avoiding looking at him. 

“It’s okay, I’m not going to be upset. Can you tell me what’s wrong?” He gently tilted her chin so she was looking at him. 

She shifted back and forth nervously for a second before asking so quietly that Peter didn’t think he would have been able to hear it if not for his enhanced hearing, “I can come home with you?” 

Peter felt his face soften. “Of course you can come home with me. You’re always welcome at the tower, okay?” He held out his hand to her. “Are you good to go?”

She nodded, grabbing his hand. 

  
~  
  
  


A few days later, a local newspaper posted a picture of Spiderman and Natsuko. The picture was taken from behind, so neither of their faces were shown, just their backs silhouetted by the street lamps as they walked down the deserted sidewalk. After a long discussion with Pepper and Tony, they decided to leave the picture up, as it was in no way recognizable as Natsuko.

(And if Peter took a screenshot of the photo and made it his screen saver, well, no one needed to know that.) 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!


	5. A Family Of More Than Just Blood

Five years ago, had someone told Tony that he would be making grilled cheese for three teenagers as they sat in his living room playing video games, he would have openly laughed in their face (and offered to pay for their psych exam). Yet here he was. Flipping grilled cheese as MJ destroyed Peter and Natsuko at Mario Kart. It really wasn’t even a fair competition; Natsuko had never played any sort of video game before, and Peter, despite his lightning fast reflexes, had the attention span of at best a butterfly. All things considered, they were putting up a valiant fight, but they didn’t stand a chance against MJ. 

It had been about a month and a half since Natsuko had first come over for dinner, and since then she had been coming over more and more often. MJ was already a frequent resident of the Stark living room, and Peter and MJ just incorporated Natsuko right into their group of friends. More often than not, Tony could find the three of them splayed across the couch, working on homework or just hanging out. 

MJ usually headed home at about five, but Natsuko often stayed later, regularly staying for dinner. After she had stayed over the night that Peter had saved her as Spiderman, that had become a more common occurrence as well, and at that point, Natsuko slept at the tower as many as two or three times a week. Tony found, rather to his surprise, that he didn’t mind at all. On the contrary, it was quite enjoyable to have her there; she fit in well with their little family. She had been quite cautious around Tony and Pepper at first, preferring to stay close to Peter at all times, but after a few weeks she started opening up around Tony and Pepper as well. 

One of the major changes brought about by Natsuko’s becoming more comfortable with them was that she started practicing violin at the tower. Instead of staying at school to practice, Peter had convinced her to come home with him right after school and practice there instead. They set up one of the unused guest rooms with a nice music stand, and that served as her practice space (and her sleeping space as well, when she stayed the night). 

At first, she had kept the door closed while she played, not wanting to be in the way, but after much haggling on Peter’s part and multiple reassurances from both Pepper and Tony that it would not be a bother at all, she conceded and left the door ajar during her practicing. 

Tony had watched a few of the videos of Natsuko playing violin, but it was even more astounding in person. It was hard to believe that the little girl who barely came up to Tony’s chest — and Tony was not a tall man — and almost started crying the first time she ate ice cream, was the same person who played violin with such cool confidence and deep emotion. He just couldn’t wrap his head around how someone so small and  _ young _ could play with such skill and maturity. 

Almost more than her playing, Tony was amazed by her actual process of practicing; both how  _ much _ she practiced and how controlled she was when she was doing it. She usually alternated every hour or so between practicing and doing homework afterschool, but Peter had also told them that she would go in to school early, often more than two hours before the day started, to practice then as well. Between the two, she got in a good four hours of practicing a day. Tony was blown away by the fact that someone so young could be so dedicated. 

It wasn’t just that she practiced a lot; she practiced  _ well _ . In listening to Natsuko practice, Tony learned that there was much more to playing violin than just playing pretty melodies. He had seen plenty of violin performances in his day, but he had never realized how much work went on behind the scenes. Not only did Natsuko work on full pieces, but she also, every practice, spent a significant amount of time practicing scales and etudes. When Peter asked why, Natsuko had explained that the techniques from the scales and etudes often came up in the actual pieces she was playing and practicing them in isolation made it easier to play when they did. 

What struck Tony the most was the juxtaposition of Natsuko when she was playing violin and when she wasn’t. When she was playing, she seemed to forget everything around her, until it was just her and the music, as one. When she was playing, it was easy to imagine that she was some silent, untouchable robot. But then she would stop, and the cool, confident exterior would fade away and she would again fade back into just an adorable, dorky kid. Some of Tony’s fondest memories from those first few months were seeing Natsuko’s playful, bubbly personality shine through her shy exterior. He could still pinpoint the moment when he had realized that somehow, without any of them noticing, Natsuko had become more than just another one of Peter’s friends, but part of their family. 

  
~

He had been sitting on the couch, reading something unmemorable, when Peter and Natsuko walked in, deep in conversation. 

“What do you mean, ‘no’?!” Peter exclaimed, dropping his backpack on the ground by the island. 

Natsuko shook her head, giggling. 

“But I’m so clearly the coolest. There’s, like, not even any competition!”

Natsuko shook her head again dramatically before carefully putting her backpack down next to Peter’s. 

“Okay. How ‘bout this. Repeat after me: Spiderman is my favorite Avenger.”

She tilted her head at Peter for a second. “Not an Avenger.”

“Oh, come on!” Peter exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. “You wound me.” He put an arm over his chest and threw his head back on mock betrayal.

She let out another giggle and stuck her tongue at his theatrics. 

“Fine.” Peter dramatically turned his head away from her. “Who is your favorite Avenger then.”

Natsuko though for a moment before responding, “Thor.”

“Thor!” Peter gaped at her. “What has Thor ever done for you? You’ve never even met him!”

“Thor.” Natsuko said again, resolutely. 

“But I gave you a cookie yesterday. Does that mean nothing to you?” Peter said, flopping down down in one of the chairs at the island. 

Natsuko gave him a disbelieving look then said something in Japanese to FRIDAY.

FRIDAY responded in Japanese as well before pulling up a hologram video in front of the two of them. 

Tony immediately recognized its contents as the events of the day before. It showed Peter, MJ, and Natsuko all sitting at the island, similarly to how Peter and Natusko were at that moment in real life. Video Peter had just pulled a bag of cookies out of his backpack and was excitedly opening them. 

“Peter,” video Tony said as he walked into the frame, “it’s rude to eat without offering some to your guests.”

“What do you  _ mean _ .” Video Peter wined. “They practically live here, I stopped having to be nice to them forever ago. Anyway, I won them playing Kahoot in Physics. They’re  _ miiiiine. _ ” He dramatically clutched the cookies to his chest. 

Video  MJ, without even looking up from her homework, responded, “You only won because Natsuko told you all of the states in Japan and what each of the Chinese New Year symbols represented.”

“Wait,” video Tony interjected, “didn’t you say this was in physics? Why would you need to know the Japanese states or the Chinese New Years characters?”

“It's a long story. You don’t want to know.” Video MJ said deadpan as video Natsuko let out a little huff of laughter. 

“Oh-kay.” Video Tony said, stretching out the word. “Anyways, by the sounds of it, Natsuko is the reason you have the cookies in the first place. So really, you should give them  _ all _ to her.”

“But  _ Daaaad _ .” 

Peter only called Tony ‘Dad’ when he was half asleep or being over dramatic. Tony was unmoved. 

“Nope. Don’t want to hear it.”

“Fine.” Video Peter huffed. “Natsuko, do you want a cookie.”

Video  Natsuko bobbed her whole body back and forth in an enthusiastic nod. Peter pretended to be unhappy as he gave it to her, but he couldn’t hold back his smile at how excited she looked holding one of the cookies, which was quite nearly the size of her head. Unable to help himself, he reached out and ruffled Natsuko’s hair — earning him an indignant little squeak — before going back to his homework. 

“Okay, that’s enough FRIDAY.” Peter said as Friday shut off the video. “Why do you always side with her? It’s not very nice.”

“Maybe it’s because she’s not a little trouble maker.” Tony piped up from where he was sitting before FRIDAY could respond. 

Peter and Natsuko both looked up in surprise. 

“You saw all of that, didn’t you?” Peter asked, looking resigned. 

“Yep.” Tony responded, popping the ‘p’. “Saw and thoroughly enjoyed.”

Peter let out a long suffering sigh. “Well, at least I still have another cookie left to dull the meanness of you two.”

Tony saw Natsuko struggling to keep in her giggling, but didn’t say anything. 

“Wait!” Peter said, looking around at the counter frantically. “Where’s my cookie?!” 

At this point it was simply too much for Natsuko, and she burst out laughing. 

“You didn’t.” Peter looked at her, looking thoroughly betrayed. “Oh you little…” He started making his way towards where she sat, still shaking with laughter. “I was going to be nice and let the whole ‘Thor’ thing go, but not now! You are a cookie thief! And, as we know, there is only one punishment for cookie thieves: ticking!”

Natsuko let out a shriek of laughter as Peter lunged for her. Tony couldn’t keep the simple off his face watching the two of them chase each other all over the kitchen. He knew that Peter could easily have caught Natsuko — he was Spiderman for crying out loud —, but instead he was happy to chase her around, letting her always stay a few paces in front of him. 

It had struck Tony then just how normal, how domestic, it seemed. Watching the way that Peter and Natsuko interacted with each other, you could easily believe that they were siblings who had been playing and laughing together for their entire lives, not for just over three months. 

At one point in their mock battle, Natsuko came over and began using Tony like a shield. As she hid behind him, giggling so hard she could barely stand, Tony had realized that somehow, over the course of the last three years, he had ended up with not one, but two kids, and, even more importantly, that that thought made him incredibly happy. 

Somehow, these two fabulous, dorky kids had wormed their way into his life and filled it with the joy and laughter and happiness that he hadn’t even known it was missing. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading. I’m going to keep posting one shots and multi-chapter fics in this universe so keep and eye out!


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